Of dubious debates, kisses and divas

Must we choose between a pretentious jackass and a man who lacks the basic skills? And what's with Madonna's rhinestone cowgirl persona?

By Camille Paglia

Oct 4, 2000 | As I file this, the first presidential debate between George W. Bush and Al Gore has not yet aired, so by the time you read this, you will know whether Bush stumbled and bumbled or held his own and whether Gore demonstrated his IQ and expertise or came off as a pretentious jackass.

What I am certain of, without benefit of the debate, is that I cannot in good conscience vote for either one of them. While Bush would probably, if elected, be a conscientious, affable chief executive who would restore bipartisan cooperation to government, I simply don't feel he has the basic skills or mastery of facts to be a major party nominee at this stage in his life. The Republican Party seems adrift: it's still weighed down by skanky, provincial blowhards like Sen. Trent Lott, Rep. Dick Armey and Rep. Henry Hyde, while its sharpest, shrewdest, most dynamic members seem to be women -- from Pat Harrison, Co-Chairman of the Republican National Committee, and campaign consultant Mary Matalin to outspoken Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine.

Gore, on the other hand, may be ethically undeserving of the highest office in the land. Until his guttersnipe primary fight with Bill Bradley (for whom I voted), I thought of Gore as a smart, competent, if unflashy public-affairs specialist. Since I've always liked his spunky wife Tipper, even during her campaign for music labeling, I gave Gore the benefit of the doubt and assumed he'd shine once he emerged from Bill Clinton's shadow. But week by week this year, as I watched Gore bob, weave, pander and lie, I came to detest him as an empty suit who, like Hollywood Hillary, has no deep convictions beyond a lust for personal power.

My decision to vote for Ralph Nader was strengthened by C-Span's live broadcast two weeks ago of the massive Green Party rally in Minneapolis, which drew 12,000 ticket-buying supporters. Democratic partisans who claim that a vote for Nader is a "wasted" vote are betrayers of authentic democracy. There is no such thing as a wasted vote. The only wasted vote is the one not cast. Every vote is an expression of principle and an exercise in free speech. Too many Democrats are bowing to peer pressure from friends and associates and suppressing their revulsion from the gross ethical lapses of the Clinton-Gore administration. This kind of capitulation to the tyranny of the group smacks of the conservative, conformist 1950s.

I was very impressed when Nader was introduced at the Minneapolis rally with the stirring call, "Vote for someone who's done more good for this country than Bush and Gore combined!" For nearly 40 years, Nader's pioneering work as a consumer advocate has made history. Of course I realize that Nader has no chance of being elected and that he lacks government experience as well as the temperament to be a successful administrator. But I love his idealism, his incisive intellect, his command of detail and his crisp analysis of wide-ranging social issues. He is the only voice in this campaign, for example, who has denounced the looting of corporations by overpaid top executives and who focuses on the plight of workers at national chains like Burger King and Wal-Mart. Those non-unionized employees, as he says, "can't make a living wage," and their salary is often eaten up by transportation costs.

A vote for Gore is a vote for the status quo. A vote for Gore rewards the corrupt superstructure of the Democratic party and ensures that it will not change, that it will go right on with business as usual, locked in parasitic intercourse with upper-middle-class special-interest groups and craven media flacks. The best hope for a rejuvenated Democratic party is a humiliating defeat this November.

American politics desperately needs a strong third-party alternative. The Reform Party was too predicated on the cranky charisma of one independently wealthy individual, founder Ross Perot. The Green Party, in contrast, has the precedents of European Green Party campaigns to call on, and it would contain a broader spectrum of philosophical strains. I will vote the Green Party ticket this fall not because I believe in all its positions -- far from it! -- but because I think progressive politics needs to grow up.

History shows that communism and socialism in their purest form have been totalitarian disasters, depressing economic development and abridging free thought and speech. The progressive wing needs to acknowledge that capitalism is not satanic -- that it is, for example, the foundation of modern feminism, giving Western women financial self-sufficiency. Vibrant markets create wealth and ensure employment.

But capitalism is innately Darwinian. Hence business needs a counterbalancing ethical force for social justice. I fervently agree with the Greens that the biosphere must not be poisoned nor irreplaceable natural resources pillaged. We have a responsibility to posterity. Furthermore, an affluent society -- particularly one whose government freely tosses billions of dollars around the globe -- should not leave anyone without basic medical care, decent housing and a solid education. But federal funding should not mean federal control; citizens should not be wards of the state. Local decisions are better made by states and municipalities.

Excessive regulation of business is always counterproductive, and "redistribution of wealth" is a self-stagnating, Marxist pipe dream. But stockholders, who actually own the corporations, need encouragement and empowerment from a mature Green Party to challenge their Marie Antoinette boards of directors and throw them out when they approve the astronomical salaries and piratical golden parachutes of top executives, which are grotesquely out of scale with the bargain-basement wages of rank-and-file employees.

In reviewing the flood of e-mail messages to this column from Salon readers over the past year, I have been struck by the softness of support for Gore. Letters about Bush are divided: two-thirds warmly praise him and warn me not to underestimate him, while one-third attack his record in Texas as a sham. But letters about Gore have been strangely muted. They tend to be short and snide (focusing on me rather than on political issues), and even when they stick to the facts, they seethe with cloudy, paranoid fantasies about a Republican administration and make no attempt to defend Gore per se. Indeed, I have yet to receive a single, substantive, well-written letter about Gore's credentials or suitability for the presidency.

Next Page: Gore's Clintonesque use of his wife as a showy sex doll

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